Robert John
Robert John was born and raised on a tropical island paradise known as Guam, a territory of the United States where you can’t physically be more than 6 miles from the ocean at any given time. Because of this, his story with the ocean began at the very young age of two years old. Robert found himself on a boat fishing every weekend with his father for game fish like mahi-mahi, tuna, wahoo, and other fish caught via high speed trolling.
He was never really into free diving or spearfishing growing up. It wasn’t until his cousin Nicolas moved back to Guam from a duty station in Hawaii where Nicolas had been spearfishing often. Robert was impressed when Nick would bring up big fish on one breath and this is where the addiction started. At 20 years old and after having a kid of his own, Robert decided it was time to give up some of his hobbies including drift racing, drag racing and building fast cars. Spearfishing being less expensive (most of the time) Robert asked Nicolas to teach him.
Robert picked up spearfishing and free diving quickly and with each dive trip both of them advanced into greater depths and further distances. From there, they eventually moved into blue water spearfishing from shore. This method of spearfishing was almost unheard of in the waters of Guam - A reputation for being dangerous and having many sharks. Guam was a place where most people would only dive the reef. In February of 2016, a competition was held from shore in a village called Umatac. Robert joined this competition with Peter Heradura; a friend and dive buddy of his for the first time. Together they brought back three mahi and a 47lb wahoo on a shore dive. This was the largest wahoo ever recorded captured by spear at the time on Guam. This event sparked interest around the island and local newspapers that it technically shifted the way Guam spearos fished.
With more and more spearos adopting this method of spearfishing, Robert wanted to be notorious for landing these big game fish so he continued to spearfish the blue and land larger fish by recording it all on camera. In February 2017, Robert and Peter brought back in another large wahoo during the annual Umatatc competition. This time it weighed in at 51lbs and once again, taking home the trophy for 1st place largest fish.
Robert considers himself a competitive spear fisherman, so in 2018 he began his journey into Baja Mexico to compete in the blue water world cup. He took 1st place for reef fish with a large Pargo and took 3rd place overall out of around 26 competitors amongst the best from all over the world. In his eyes this was his greatest accomplishment in spearfishing. These events ultimately led up to Robert filming his adventures and spearfishing trips and posting them on the platforms that allows him to exhibit his version of art, Instagram and youtube. Big brands in spearfishing began to notice Robert’s videos including Evolve Diving, Aussie reels USA and Alchemy Spearfishing. Robert is now an ambassador for these brands and a proud team member of Alchemy Spearfishing. Keep an eye out for his upcoming videos and events!